Hrm, it's news mostly John H?

John H.; for those of us not familiar with your information network can you explain in a little more detail than is possible in a single sentence exactly who the organization you work for is , and what they do?

Maybe creative lighting will strike.

Link, John H?

John--maybe they could bring back the "eight cents a day" person to come up with something striking. Of course, you guys probably want to strangle the eight cents a day person, but you have to admit at least it was memorable. At the moment the publicity (not just for the online service--all of it) just screams "cash-strapped public broadcaster"--it's what for some reason I imagine publicity for American PBS being like.

(Everyone else--I'm not being intentionally annoying by not mentioning the name of John and Plasmo's organisation; I'm just not sure how comfortable they are with having it explicitly mentioned.)

(Everyone else--I'm not being intentionally annoying by not mentioning the name of John and Plasmo's organisation; I'm just not sure how comfortable they are with having it explicitly mentioned.)

'twas understood, Angus.

you guys probably want to strangle the eight cents a day person, but you have to admit at least it was memorable.

Changes in government funding mean that it's nowadays a much less euphonious "six point eight cents a day".

Thanks for your offers of help everyone, but because this is a large bureaucratic organisation, your creativity would almost get crushed by a committee or overlooked by a panel or dismissed by a focus group or a combination of the above.

So now that I've committed the sackable offense of Bringing the Organisation Into Disrepute, I'll tell that our front page is here and I'll be fascinated to know what impression it makes on you.

John, insent.

it's what for some reason I imagine publicity for American PBS being like.

Actually there are some really good commercials for it. People using stuff they learned on the programs, like the little girl who gets up at 4, sneaks out to the barn with a lantern and makes the cock crow to the artificial daylight.

There was another a year or so ago with a girl on a frillly canopy bed who's going into this whole psuedo-literary romance rant about how she can't see some guy because she wants more, then cut to her little brother who's all. "So you want me to tell him what?" with an eyeroll.

John, the site certainly focuses on the news aspect. If I hadn't paid attention to the what the title said, I would have not known it.

Can you give me a rundown of the other broadcast networks in Australia?

Thanks Fiona!

Can you give me a rundown of the other broadcast networks in Australia?

Well I could but it would only throw our problem into more stark relief.

The problem with Where I Work (by the way, I didn't wait for Plasmo's permission, but Plasmo's real name is not, you'll be shocked to learn, Plasmo, whereas mine really is John H[something] so I'm identifiable and she's not) is that we do so much.

I could show you the website of Channel Ten or Seven, but they just do TV, so their website doesn't have the category problem we have. I could show you the website of radio station 2UE or 2GB, who compete with our Sydney station 2BL, but they just do radio, so, same problem.

We have a TV channel, we have five national radio networks, an international radio network, seven Capital City radio stations, fifty regional and rural radio stations, shops, symphony orchestras, I could go on.

So the main question is, how the hell do you convey that depth and complication on one page? What is it the front page of, exactly -- is it the front page of the website, just one of the many things we provide, or is it the front page of the organisation as a whole?

Currently the review of the front page is in the hands of a guy who would always choose to write "re-incentivise the intra-contextual information space in a temporal re-iteration of navigational potentials" instead of "change the links more often".

Has anyone read Jakob Nielsen's book about How To Build Your Front Page?

One very solid recommendation is that you explain what your organisation does, in one simple sentence -- "eBay -- the world's online marketplace" for instance. If it's impossible to do that, does it imply that you need to have multiple front pages for the many things you do?

It's not like I wake up at night worrying about these questions at all...